Foreigners and `Foreignness' in a Group

Abstract

This article focuses on a group which had great difficulties in becoming the kind of group where members feel they belong. It looks at how one group member acted out the feelings of estrangement and foreignness' for the whole grouip by remaining a foreigner in the group as she was in real life. It examines the group conductor's collusion with the group, and in particular with this member, which led to the conductor's inability to accomplish what Marrone (1994) calls `Task 1. To increase (through analytic means) cohesiveness and a sense of affiliation so that the group can become a secure base from which it is possible to explore the members' inner worlds.' In this case it required the arrival of a new g0oup member to free the group from its split.